Kenny Omega Talks To Sean Waltman About His Match With Okada, BTE v New Day, Vader's Passing, His Future, More

NJPW star and current IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kenny Omega is Sean Waltman’s guest this week on his podcast X-Pac 12360.

Waltman’s team sent the following transcribed highlights from the episode to WrestleZone. You can hear the full episode in the embedded player at the top of this post or via the links at the bottom of this post.

Kenny Omega On His 7-Star Match with Kazuchika Okada at NJPW Dominion:

A lot of thought and care went into all of that stuff {match layout}.What moves are we gonna do? What are the finishes going to be? Of course that’s all part of it. It’s what story do we tell that compliments the other three matches that we’ve done? What story do we tell that leaves something open for a possible fifth match because even though we were never told there was gonna be a fifth match. I have a feeling there’s gonna be a fifth match. So I didn’t want to blow everything in that match. And I wanted to leave it so that there is gonna be another one. And I also still wanted to make it sort of based in reality where this is sort of the be-all-end-all and the match decides which one of us is superior for at least this point in time but I didn’t feel like we had to overkill anything. And there’s so many factors that go into it and I really tried to carefully consider them all. The story surrounding the match, the story within the match, the story that happens before, the story that happens after…There’s so much to go over and I wanted each fall to look different enough from one another so that it did really look like three different matches. And I wanted all the matches to make both of us look good, I wanted them to highlight our strengths as performers.

Kenny Omega On The Pressure Of Following Okada’s Reign And His Hopes For His Own Title Reign:

No, I would feel pressure if there was the pressure to be a textbook wrestler, to be a textbook wrestler and have a textbook wrestler-ish run. Okada had that covered completely and he had done things that no one else could really ever do, he was one of the greatest title runs of all time. Luckily, I’m kind of not the conventional wrestler and a lot of my matches visually appear similar to one another so my hope is to kind of have a very original looking run, where I am digging deeper into everyone’s character and kind of adding layers to the people I work with, so that way all of the defenses look different from one another. The matches themselves may even be different or original or whatever, so I don’t feel like I have to fill Okada’s shoes… Even though people may not prefer my run over Okada’s, I want them to kind of recognize it as something original and unique and hopefully enjoyable.

Kenny Omega On Celebrating His IWGP Title Win With The Young Bucks:

It’s funny we’d created this storyline where we would all kind of go splitsville. And we really pushed it to the extreme where we wouldn’t be seen in public we’d only talk to each other in private. In the BTE {Being The Elite} storyline, we weren’t in any scenes together and the only actual physical altercation we ended up having was the match in Long Beach. So we sort of worked ourselves into a shoot brother. Where we were sort of actually forced to live out this lie where we were at odds with each other. So for us to finally kinda come together and in Japan too. Another thing to mention is, it’s really Kayfabed out there. You can’t just go out to a restaurant after a show cause ‘hey it’s not the show anymore’. You have to continue, you have to keep faith and stay true to the angles. So we couldn’t hang out before shows, after shows, nothing like that unless it was in private. And usually, I’m always tied up with whatever after the shows… We never saw each other so for us to finally come together and have that as our first moment. Where it’s like ‘yes it’s okay to be friends again’ it was really emotional.

Kenny Omega Remembers Vader:

Terrible news. I was absolutely shocked when it happened. Especially since he just had just gone through that crazy surgery where it was just miraculous that he got through it all. You can never be prepared for news like that and luckily all the memories I have of Vader when I’ve met him in person were really really pleasant. He was always a very pleasant individual. He was actually the reason I was able to get my first work visa in Japan. Because he had a promotion in Japan for a moment in time where he was running shows every three or four months. And if it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t have been able to legally work in Japan until actually signing with New Japan. Mostly because of Vader I was able to legally wrestle and make money in Japan.

Kenny Omega On His Upcoming Match With Golden Lovers Partner Kota Ibushi at NJPW G1 Climax:

I mean both of us think it’s too soon, both of us really had it in our minds that we don’t want to re-visit it unless it’s the Tokyo Dome because we get sort of too crazy with one another. And we push each others limits too far and it’s scary {laughs} especially Ibushi and I always feel like I can’t be in this guy’s shadow so I have to meet his craziness and that just creates an endless circle of one-upmanship.

Kenny Omega On The Support He Received From WWE For The E3 Gaming Competition Against The New Day:

The amount of support I had from their side {WWE} was certainly surprising. And I’m thankful for it, we really went out and tried to do something new…I really think that we need to get out and explore other options as to how to make wrestling fun and cool again. How to kinda introduce what we do to a brand new audience and gaming was a way to do that. And The New Day… well especially Austin Creed/Xavier Woods himself, he has that really popular Youtube gaming channel and he’s always involved in anything gaming and we sort of have the video gaming rivalry because we can’t have an in-ring rivalry being part of two different companies. And to have the blessing of both companies, and the overwhelming support by WWE was really cool. It’s a possible big game changer, we broke a lot of records with just that event alone and I think it goes to show that all the companies and these wrestlers, we can play nice with each other and it is entertaining and that’s the type of involvement as champion that I want to have.

Kenny Omega On Wanting To Defend Tetsuya Naito and Hiroshi Tanahashi

I would love to wrestle Naito in an actual championship capacity rather than just the G1. I’d love to wrestle Tanahashi because I feel that he was always the protected ace of the company and now he’s getting run down and beaten down and he knows that he’s sort of on his way out of being a top four guy. And I really want to have sort of a special moment with him if it’s possible. And I know he kinda hates me in real life… it’s like a professional jealousy thing that’s all it is {laughs}. Not actually hates me hates me, you know I love him but we love to hate each other because we have very different views on wrestling

Sean ‘X-Pac’ Waltman Talks Big Cass Getting Released By WWE:

Just based on the one incident that everybody knows about with him beating up the little guy after they told him not too. He was going against a direct order that put him in the doghouse and obviously when you’re in the doghouse it’s easy to get a really bad attitude, really easy. And that goes for anyone. It’s so important to maintain a positive attitude when you’re going through that type of thing… The open market for wrestlers is a fairly healthy market and I think he is going to do fine when he gets on that market.

Sean ‘X-Pac’ Waltman Talks Ronda Rousey vs. Nia Jax At Money In The Bank:

I just want to talk about Ronda Rousey and what an amazing job she did in her singles match with Nia Jax. She’s better at the things that really count than people who have been in the business for decades that are doing well in the industry. When I talk about the things somebody should study when they’re watching somebody’s match it’s not the moves, it’s the things that are done in-between the moves; the expressions on the face and you have to stay in the moment to be able to do all those little things and be able to be such a detailed worker in there.

Sean ‘X-Pac’ Waltman Remembers Vader:

Towards the end there he talked about his health issues and he was actively campaigning to be in the Hall Of Fame. And it’s really sad to me looking back now that he wasn’t inducted while he was alive. And it makes me really sad to think about that.

Get it all on this week’s brand new episode of AfterBuzz TV’s X-Pac 12360. Two words for you…DOWNLOAD IT! X-Pac 1,2,360 is also available for download on iTunes and Android devices.